Subtle Blood

by KJ Charles

  No more shots. He edged his way on his elbows to the end of the tree trunk and cautiously peered out.

  There was a man, a big one, on the path. The sun was right behind him from the angle Will lay at, and all he could see was a dark, bulky shape. He only had a second to look, then the man moved. Will jerked his head back, and the bullet ploughed into the earth a foot from his nose, spraying dry earth into his face.

  Four shots gone. He was unarmed, and the enemy knew exactly where he was. If he came a few paces forward, he could reach over the trunk and fire the last two bullets, and there was pretty much fuck all Will could do about it.

  You planned a future and look what happened.

  He looked back toward Kim. He was sitting up against a tree, with the very straight posture of a man whose backbone was trying to crawl to safety, and he caught Will’s eye and raised three fingers. Will held up an irritable four—couldn’t he count?—even as Kim changed his to two, then one, and sprang up like a rocketing pheasant, hurtling towards the shoulder-high bracken, right in the enemy’s sight-line. There was another shot, and Will was up and diving for cover even as Kim stumbled, and crashed forward, and lay still.

  A bullet zipped close to Will’s feet, and that made six.

  My turn. You’re dead.

  Will’s hand closed round a rock. He turned and threw a savage overarm, the cricketing boy he’d been meeting the murderous man he was, and it hit the revolver squarely as the enemy fumbled to reload. The spare clip sprang from his hand, and Will’s second rock caught him right on the temple. He reeled back. Will was already up and sprinting for him, a fallen branch in hand, and the big man broke and ran full tilt down the path, hurling the empty gun away as he fled.

  Will’s overwhelming instinct was to chase after him, bring him down, and beat him to a bloody pulp on the pinewood floor. But the part of his brain that wasn’t hot with rage was cold with fear, and after a few frantic seconds, it swamped the heat with dread.

  He turned back and ran, crashing through the bracken towards the prone body. “Kim? Kim!”

  Kim was face down, unmoving. “Oh Jesus,” Will said, the words emerging high and strangled because his throat was closing. “Christ, no. Kim.” He dropped to his knees, reached for the still form, grabbed his face.

  Kim jerked his head away. “Ow. What—?”

  “God.” Will sat back on his heels. “Mother of God. Are you all right?”

  “Fine. I think.” Kim pushed himself up, and sat heavily on the bracken. His face was smeared with earth and there was a nasty scrape on his temple and he was alive. Will tried to remember how breathing worked. “The gunman?”

  “Gone.”

  “You got him?”

  “Knocked the gun out of his hand when he ran out of ammo. He legged it. I came back to get you.”

  “Why the hell didn’t you follow him?”

  “I thought you were shot, you bastard. I thought you were dead.”

  “Don’t be so dramatic.” Kim put a cautious hand to his temple. “I caught my foot on something, and knocked myself silly when I hit the ground. Did I say earlier I was fond of these gardens? I take it back.”

  “Same. Sod this place.” Will put out a hand. Kim gripped it. He was definitely alive, and his sleeve was torn in a familiar way. “You’re hit.”

  “I’m not.” Kim squinted at his own upper arm and inserted a finger into the hole. “Good God. It went through the cloth. That was close.”

  An inch to the left and he’d be bleeding. Six inches to the left and he’d be dead. Will seriously regretted his decision to give up the chase: he wanted five minutes with the enemy and the Messer, or a rock, or just his fists. He’d make do.

  Kim touched his arm. “I’m fine, Will. Stop looking like that. Are you hurt?”

  “No, because you drew his fire when he had me pinned.”

  “With an acrobatic leap face-first into the soil. Truly the war lost something by my absence.”

  Will was pretty sure it had. “Can you stand?”

  “Are we sure he’s gone?”

  “He’s welcome to come back, if he wants his spine pulled out through his arse.”

  “I’ll hold your coat. Did you get a look at him?”

  Will shook his head. “Not a good one. The sun was behind him, and then I was concentrating on his hands. Big man. Bulky. Thick as mince, because he could have had us both with a bit of tactical thinking.”

  “Big, broad, and stupid,” Kim said. “How strangely familiar that sounds. Let’s go back to the house, shall we?”

  They headed back, Will picking up the empty gun as they went. Kim leaned on Will’s arm for a bit as they set off, until his head cleared. That could have been nice in other circumstances, but the mood had been pretty comprehensively ruined. They went back a different route through the gardens, Will keeping a very sharp eye out for strangers, and made it back to the house without further assault.

  Hastings the butler emerged as they came into the entrance hall. He looked wide-eyed at them both. “Ah, Lord Arthur, I— Are you all right?”

  “No,” Kim said. “I am not. I take it Lord Chingford has returned?”

  “Yes, Lord Arthur, he—”

  “Where is he?”

  The butler’s eyes flicked between them. “In the morning room with his lordship, but—”

  “Excellent,” Kim said. “If you hear screaming, my advice would be to do something else in a distant part of the house, out of earshot.”

  He stalked forward. Moving like a wolf, Will thought, and his own wolf snarled in response.

  They came to a door. Kim opened it with force and went in without ceremony. Will shut it behind them.

  Lord Chingford was standing on the carpet looking as sulky as an overgrown schoolboy. The Marquess, seated, turned to face them with cold anger. “Arthur. Where have you been?”

  “Getting shot at,” Kim said. “In the pine wood, by a big stupid man. Anything to say, Chingford?”

  “What?” said the Marquess.

  “Eh?” Chingford added.

  “Shot at,” Kim said, enunciating clearly. “With a gun. There is a bullet hole in my sleeve.”

  “Nonsense,” the Marquess said.

  Kim inhaled dangerously. Will said, “Hold on. Has Lord Chingford been in here long?”

  The Marquess turned to look at him, lip curling, eyes full of such breathtaking contempt that Will recoiled a half step. He wasn’t sure he’d been looked at like that in his life: he hadn’t been important enough to come in for the scorn of generals.

  “This individual will be silent,” the Marquess said, every word a slap. “And you will explain yourself, Arthur.”

  “I explained yesterday,” Kim said. “Answer his question.”

  “You lied yesterday, as is your invariable and contemptible habit. Explain!” The Marquess picked a newspaper off the table and slapped it down the other way up. That let Will see the picture of his own face under the headline HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN?

  “Sod,” he said.

  Kim barely glanced at it. “The Daily Mirror? I thought you took The Times.”

  “I will not brook this insolence!” the Marquess shouted. “You have brought a criminal to this house! How dare you, sir? How dare you? This man is accused of murder!”

  “So is Chingford,” Kim said. “And if it’s good enough for him...”

  The Marquess inhaled. Will got into the momentary silence. “Can you answer my question? How long has Chingford been in here?”

  “Keep your damned mouth shut in the presence of your betters,” Chingford snarled at him. “Have Hastings call the police, Father.”

  “Do that,” Kim said. “I’ll give them the notebook and tell them how you breached your bail.”

  The Marquess and Lord Chingford went off like howitzers at that, simultaneous and loud, and Kim started shouting back. Will wasn’t sure he’d seen Kim shout before. He usually ran cold, not hot, but he was spitting nails now, face reddening.


  Will wasn’t here for a family row. He looked between the three enraged men, ugly and alike in their fury, pulled the empty gun from his pocket, and levelled it at Chingford’s face, right between the eyes.

  It wasn’t subtle, but they shut up.

  “I’ll ask once more,” he said into the silence. “How long’s Lord Chingford been in here with you, Lord Flitby? And the answer needs to be a number of minutes. Anything else and I’ll pull the trigger.”

  “At least an hour,” the Marquess said, through frozen lips.

  “Thank you.” Will lowered the gun. Kim held out a hand and Will chucked it to him. “If he’d run back here, he’d still have been sweating when we got in. It wasn’t him.”

  “Damnation,” Kim said. “Leo.”

  “How the hell does he know we’re here?”

  “And is this just aimed at muddying the waters round Quiller and Chingford?” Kim’s eyes sparked. “Or is he afraid we’ll find something?”

  “Arthur!” Flitby said, voice commanding. “You will explain—”

  “Quiet, we’re busy. Chingford, you need to tell us everything. How you knew Fairfax. All your dealings. What you argued with him about, what happened that night, who you’ve talked to since we got here. All of it. Now.”

  Chingford’s lip curled. “Go to hell, you bloody pansy.”

  “Fine,” Kim said. “Will? I think we’re at the last resort.”

  “Christ, me too,” Will said, and kicked Lord Chingford in the stomach.

  Chapter Twenty

  He doubled over. Will put an elbow into his kidney—partly to incapacitate, partly he just liked the thought of the man pissing blood—then got him in a headlock and marched him to the door. He pulled it open, rammed the Earl’s head against the doorframe, and shut it again.

  Not all the way. Just enough that Lord Chingford’s skull was firmly jammed between oak and oak. A bit forcefully, perhaps.

  “I hear you used to do this to Kim,” he said. “Turnabout’s fair play, right?”

  Lord Flitby and Chingford were both shouting. Will put a bit more pressure on the door until his victim howled, and said, “Everyone shut up. All right, two choices. You talk now, or I slam the door a few times and then you talk. It’s up to you. I’ve got all day.”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” Chingford said, sounding congested. “Father!”

  “I would, you know,” Will said. “I’ve killed a lot of men. Mostly with knives, a couple with bare hands, one with a rock. Door’s a new one on me but I’ll give it a try. You’re thinking I won’t, but that’s because you weren’t at the Front. You were sat on your arse in a nice leather chair, propping up a desk between meals, while I was up to my knees in mud and blood. You did your killing from a distance, didn’t you? The spoiled food, the boots that let the water in and set our feet rotting: that was paperwork to you and a nice bit of profit, but it was life and death to men out there. Mostly death. A lot of death. I spent years wading through bodies while you were at home lining your pockets at our expense, and you know what, Lord Chingford, I don’t want you to talk. I want to slam this door as hard as I can, again and again till the crunch sounds wet, because you’re a fucking traitor.” He had to take a second to breathe there. The silence in the room was absolute. “But Kim wants to ask you questions, and that’s all that’s keeping you alive right now. Only, if one word comes out of your mouth that isn’t an answer, one single bit of denial, I’m going to smash your skull like a soft-boiled egg.”

  That, he felt, covered everything. He glanced around the room. Chingford was awkwardly doubled over, head trapped between door and frame, not struggling any more. Flitby stood, white-faced. Kim had his arse propped on the back of a low chair and the gun in his hand. It was pointing at a downward angle, but unquestionably in the direction of his father.

  “Will,” he said, in a tone of studied calm. “Are we under control?”

  That meant You aren’t going to murder him, are you? “Fine,” Will said. “But if he mucks me about, it won’t stay fine.”

  “I quite understand. I trust you do too, Chingford.”

  “You can’t—” Flitby began.

  “You’ll find we can,” Kim said. “Start with the War Department, Chingford. What were you doing?”

  “My job. Supplies.”

  “I have already told you this,” Flitby said.

  “I want it from him.”

  Will put a tad more weight on the door. “You heard him, sunshine.”

  “I had an arrangement.” Chingford sounded congested. “Several companies—gentleman’s agreements to cut down on red tape—naturally an honorarium—”

  “Spit it out,” Kim said. “You took bribes to award supply contracts.”

  “Honorarium,” Chingford insisted. “Some companies made arrangements with the Department, that’s all. Better offers. Everyone did it.”

  “I don’t think they did, you know,” Kim said. “And you received the blackmail threat when?”

  “Two years ago.”

  “How much for?”

  “Three hundred a month.”

  “You have no idea how much I would like to let Will off the leash,” Kim said. “I already know the truth, you lurching embarrassment, it’s written in Fairfax’s book! How much?”

  “A hundred and fifty,” Chingford muttered.

  “What?” Flitby said.

  “A hundred and fifty!”

  “You told Father three hundred,” Kim said. “He gave you the money and you passed on half. What did you do with the rest?”

  Chingford would probably have shuffled if he could move. “Expenses.”

  “You lied to me.” The Marquess sounded numb. “You told me three hundred—”

  “He knew you’d pay anything to cover it up,” Kim said. “If you’d told him to go to the police and take the consequences, we wouldn’t be here now. But you protected him, and he made a profit off you while you did it. Why did you need the money, Chingford?”

  “Did I not give you enough?” said Flitby harshly. “Is everything you have had not enough?”

  “No!” Chingford shouted. “No, it isn’t!”

  Will flicked a look at Kim. He was still perched on the chair back, watching his father and brother, but he looked over as if he felt Will’s gaze and their eyes met.

  Kim crossed his legs deliberately at the ankles. “Did you know it was Fairfax blackmailing you at the time?”

  “No,” Chingford said.

  “Then what was the row at the Club about?”

  “He demanded money. Three thousand.”

  Will choked. Kim said, “Ripe. Was that on top of the monthly payment, or instead of?”

  “I don’t know. I told him to go to hell. He said he’d give me a day to find the money. Asked me the next day, in the dining room, if I had it. I said no and he said he’d call Father. I told him to go to the devil.”

  “And then? What did you do about this man who was blackmailing you, who had threatened to expose you?”

  “Nothing.”

  Will made an exasperated noise. Kim said, “Really?”

  “I didn’t kill him!” Chingford shouted. “I didn’t and nobody can prove I did! You wait and see, I’ll be cleared of all this, and then you’ll regret it. I didn’t do a damn thing. I was asleep in the reading room and I’ve nothing else to say!”

  “You’re a liar,” Kim said. “Why would he threaten to call Father, rather than the police or the newspapers? And what happened to your handkerchief?”

  “Eh?”

  “Your bloodstained handkerchief was in Quiller’s possession, along with a sum of money. Where did he get that? Did he find it at the Club? In the billiard room?”

  “I don’t know!”

  “He had it and he’s dead. Was he blackmailing you too? Did you have him killed for it?”

  “It wasn’t me!” Chingford sounded almost panicked at the barrage of questions. “I don’t know how he got it and he was a bloody lying old bast
ard and it serves him right!”

  The words fell into total silence. Lord Flitby’s eyes widened. Kim looked at his brother for a moment. “I’m beginning to think you may be more stupid than I realised. Amazing. Let’s go back to the day before the murder. Fairfax asked you for three thousand pounds. He said you had a day to find the money. What did you do?”

  “Nothing. I didn’t have it.”

  “Why didn’t you ask Father?”

  “He was already paying—”

  “You were already stealing from him. What stopped you from asking for more? Or, no, let me rephrase that. What was the second blackmail about?”

  Will and Flitby both looked up at that. Chingford said, “I don’t know what you mean.” It wouldn’t have fooled a toddler.

  “You had your regular contact over the bribery payments already: Fairfax could have renegotiated the deal that way if he wanted to. Instead he spoke to you in person. A different approach, and it was about something different, wasn’t it? This time he threatened to tell Father if you didn’t pay up, and you weren’t afraid of him going to the police. Therefore the threat was social or moral, rather than legal. What was it?”

  “Go to hell,” Chingford muttered.

  “He had something else on you, a social shame. And you stewed overnight and exploded at him the next day. You were called in to see Knowle after that, and informed you’d be sacked from the Club if you didn’t apologise. What happened next?”

  “Nothing. I’ve told the police everything. I had dinner, and went for a nap, curse it!”

  Kim made an exasperated noise. “Do you want to take your secrets to the gallows, you fool? Once you left Knowle, where did you go?”

  “Hold on,” Will said. “Go back a bit. Tell us about Knowle.”

  Kim looked at him with a question in his gaze. Will shrugged. “He relaxed a bit just then. When you moved on.”

  “Did he?” Kim said, and then he froze. Lips a little parted, eyes flickering as if he was watching something unfold that nobody else could see. Flitby opened his mouth. Will jabbed a finger into the air, getting the Marquess’s attention, and put it to his lips with a meaningful look. Flitby inhaled—possibly being told to shut up was a new experience—but he didn’t speak.